


golden light, and what comes with it

by Jackson_Overland_Frost



Category: Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: Absolutely No Angst, Bennefrost only if your mind trends that way already, Celtic Mythology & Folklore, Fae & Fairies, Folklore, Gen, Japanese Mythology & Folklore, No Beta, Spirits, Witchcraft, life but romanticized and with magic, mainly those two, major character death but not really, or at least witch aesthetic bc I didn’t do any research for this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-13
Updated: 2020-09-13
Packaged: 2021-03-06 19:41:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26444344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jackson_Overland_Frost/pseuds/Jackson_Overland_Frost
Summary: The short and long-term aftermath of Pitch’s activities in Burgess, especially in the life of Jamie Bennett and his friends.
Relationships: Jamie Bennett & Jack Frost, Jamie Bennett & Sophie Bennett, Jamie Bennett/Jack Frost if you squint, The Burgess Seven - Relationship
Comments: 9
Kudos: 50





	golden light, and what comes with it

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [bubbling up](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13565469) by [Pi (Rhea)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rhea/pseuds/Pi). 



> If the writing style here is familiar and you love the movie Spirited Away, it probably is familiar! Bubbling Up by Pi(Rhea) gave me lots of emotions and I wanted to write something with a similar vibe in a different fandom, so here you go.

The Battle of Burgess didn’t leave its little Light without lasting marks. Jamie Bennett’s hands are stained with winter magic long after his new friend leaves him behind, his heart saturated with hope and wonder and dreams, his mind with lasting memories. It may have just been a few hours of his life, but it changed Jamie’s life more than the past few years. He has new friends, friends who believe in the things he believes in, and friends who proved that he was right all along. And a faith in the undiscovered that would never be stomped out — not by Pitch, and not by the passage of time. 

He is awoken early the next morning for school, and a moment of regret for the late night hardly flutters into his mind before he’s jumping for excitement. For the first time in ages, Jamie is surrounded by friends at school, not acquaintances that turn around when his Big Book of Cryptids is knocked to the hallway’s tiled floor. Cupcake is a barrier between Jamie and the flow of other students, Monty a reassuring presence in math. Sophie absorbs his belief of Jack in a heartbeat, and his mom takes his new “imaginary friend” in stride. 

Still, though a sense of normalcy eventually returns to their new group, and the Guardians became a more rare topic of conversation as they learn more about each other. As the days drift towards summer and the weather warms, Jack doesn’t return, even in the depths of July when Jamie wishes desperately for snow. The weight of Jack’s last words to him stay on his heart, the weight of the Guardians themselves. Of the spark of cold that had landed on his heart when Jack told him: “you’re a Guardian too”. 

Jamie continues to research the unknown in his spare time, reading through wikis of folklore and deities in between classes as middle school marched on. The more spirits he learns about, the more he believes in, remembering what he had been taught about sight. He begins to grow plants, just an offshoot of the money-plant his mom had grown at first, until a cluster of terracotta pots had taken over his nightstand nearest the window. More pictures joined the first on his walls, crayon drawings of the Guardians as he remembered them, and moving on to yuki onna and redcaps and wendigos. Origami cranes were strung up on strings and hung across the room, along with pressed leaves and flowers dipped in wax, and glass ornaments. 

Little crystals and trinkets get left on Jamie’s windowsills as he finds them in his drawers (though nothing silver or iron), along with little cups of milk or honey, which are often empty when he returns. The first spirit he sees, after the battle, is a bright-eyed red bird hardly larger than a cherry, perched on the edge of the cup. Jamie backs out of his room, finishes his homework in the dining room, when he returns the cup is completely empty. He writes down the mixture he had used in a notebook, and takes the cup downstairs to be washed. Honey, cinnamon, water. The next time Jamie leaves it out as a swatch on a popsicle stick alongside his newest experiment, and though it is gone when he returns from school, a shiny penny is left behind in its place. 

  
  


Blowing in with the winter solstice, Jack Frost returns to Burgess after months away. The first child he visits is Jamie, and when he swings in through the open window, he is careful not to knock over the clear shot glass of sweetened milk, nor the growing collection of swatches. He notes the bells that chime in the wind he travels with, the half-full mason jar of pennies and trinkets and little shinies. 

“Jamie?” He calls, and the boy comes barreling into his bedroom to wrap Jack up into a hug. 

“You’re back!” Jamie yells, right in Jack’s ear, and grins wide. 

“Sorry for the wait — the Guardians have been keeping me busy. I’ve been hearing all about you though, kiddo. All over the place — spirits all over are talking about you, not even just those that live around here.” Jack ruffled Jamie’s hair with his fingers, and the drop of winter he’d been holding onto all this time sings. “You’re doing good, Jamie. Really good. You really are turning into our little Guardian of Belief, huh? Keep it up and even spirits like Pitch couldn’t be bitter.” 

In time, Jamie and his friends learn to expect Jack’s arrival every winter, until they begin trying to guess the date of his last visit. Late April or early May — when was the last freeze of the season? Jamie’s gut feeling becomes a better weather forecast than the news or internet, and his wind chimes fill his bedroom with music whenever the spirits drop by to visit. Every night he falls asleep to the sight of dreamsand streaming in through his window, silently drawing him towards his bed. 

  
  


Middle school passes, and Jamie chooses drawing and painting for his first ever elective. It quickly becomes his favorite, and he paints in swirls of gold and indigo across the canvas. He excels in creative writing yet nearly fails english, clumsy with the format of formal essays. Brushing his thumb over the smooth blue stone in his pocket, Jamie grits his teeth and scrapes by geometry and algebra both. 

During the summer, Jamie’s ice cream cones stop melting, even in 90 degree weather. When he takes his hand off his glass of water, a fern of frost is left behind for barely a second before vanishing. The stain of winter seeps deeper into his skin like ink, tattooed into the palms of his hands and center of his chest and the tips of his hair, which are starting to bleach themselves white. Jamie’s mom lets him dye his hair navy blue for his birthday. 

None of his plants ever die, and now they brush their leaves against the pads of his fingers when Jamie waters them, almost affectionately. His mother’s money-plant has the place of honor both nearest the window and nearest Jamie’s bed, repotted into a colorful Christmas present from North. The first mason jar had filled, and Jamie saved up allowance to set up a more elaborate system on his windowsill. Drying herbs hang in front of the window now, rather than bells and whistles, and spirits don’t vanish anymore when the bedroom door opens. The art across his walls doubles, then triples in number, and in sophomore year Jamie takes “glass art” for his elective instead.

Jamie visits the Spice and Tea Exchange downtown and buys a few sprigs of rosemary. It was out of season, and he had run out of what he had grown and dried himself. Jamie visits the Spice and Tea Exchange downtown and buys ten different teas and five kinds of pepper. The tiny red bird that flutters around the manager looks familiar, and it happily flies away with the cinnamon-infused honey that he discreetly offers it. Jamie visits the Spice and Tea Exchange downtown and works there part-time for the rest of the year and well into the next. That Christmas, North gifts him an electric kettle for his room. Jack drops by and hands him a 12 set of silver throwing knives, each one beautiful and sharp. 

“I’ve been hearing about you, kiddo.” Jack still calls him kiddo, even though Jamie’s over an inch taller than him now. “All over the place — spirits all over are talking about you, not even just those that live around here. You’re still doing good work, but be careful, alright?”

With a smile and thanks, Jamie assures Jack that he will. 

Even when he tries, Jamie still can’t create more than a curl of frost across his window, a sharp little icicle hanging from his fingernail. That’s still enough to scare off the first troublemaker at his windowsill, a little jet black dragon that makes a big fuss about the sprigs of basil Jamie had just picked and had hanging up to dry. No one knew that the Last Light of Burgess could do anything more than the charms and enchantments of human magic, and dragons didn’t like ice. After that, his friends began to find him out by Jack’s lake, practicing his aim. Turns out all those snowball fights had been good for something, after all.

For one reason or another, Jamie doesn’t date in high school. He’s too busy, with schoolwork, with his friends, with Guarding the town. Spirits come by for a snack and something to drink, and they find a listening ear and someone who can see them. Not all of the supernatural have a folklore that Jamie can learn, but by word of mouth he continues to expand his belief system of spirits. Moonbeams and their whispery chatter, giggling in the trees to accompany the piercing cicadas. Round little shadow spirits seep out of alleyways, and Jamie finds a haven for them in a coffee shop near his school called “Inkblot”. 

Their friend group manages to stay together all eight years of middle and then high school, only managing to grow closer over time. Jamie takes Pippa to the school dances, and when he gets beaten to the chase by Caleb when they’re juniors, he asks Monty instead. All of them cry after graduation, and Jamie makes them individually promise to stay in touch. Friendships that last that long don’t die easily, and their groupchat is rarely quiet for more than a day. 

  
  


During his gap year, Jamie decides to travel. He can’t keep all his plants, so they go to his friends to brighten their rooms or their dorms. The money-plant stays with him, and though it makes traveling by human means a bit tougher, he can’t bear to leave it at home. Strings of paper cranes and silver bells he bought at the local craft store years ago are packed away, his collection of little bowls and teacups brought downstairs to be used by his family rather than his guests. 

Sophie had grown up with her older brother teaching her about spirits and belief and how to press and dry plants without them rotting. Though she’s only twelve years old, she inherits the town of Burgess with a proud smile at the responsibility. She receives Jamie’s electric kettle as a parting gift, along with much of his wardrobe — he’s traveling light, after all. The morning after Jamie leaves, Sophie finds that a small row of red toadstools has grown in one of her empty flowerpots, and she waters them with a smile. 

After assuring his mom that he doesn’t need her to pay for his travels whatsoever, Jamie lets her drive him to the Greyhound station for the first leg of his journey. It was true that he didn’t need her financial support, anyhow. Connections meant that most transportation didn’t cost anything besides his own energy, and he had been saving up for this trip for years. Though his mother allowed his supernatural venturing to take over much of the house and garden, she was never able to see Jack. Still, Jamie is grateful for her. His old manager from the Spice and Tea Exchange is waiting for him at the station, a tiny red bird about the size of a cherry perched on his shoulder. 

A waystation in New York City takes him in, and Jamie is  _ fascinated _ by the city’s supernatural population. A doorway to another world hidden in a mural, a persistent dandelion pushing through a crack in the sidewalk. The apartment he’s staying in belongs to a girl he met online and her partner, and they let him sleep on their couch with a smile and a “nice to finally meet you in person”. The two run a waystation together — a point in space for traveling spirits, as well as those who know how to use the station’s Doorways. Jamie makes them tea out of gratitude, and the partner begs half a mason jar-full of his stock after tasting it. He splurges on excellent bagels and enjoys $1 cheese pizza, visits the garment district early one morning and doesn’t return until dark, and enjoys his time in the city. At the most tourist-y shop he can find, Jamie buys a postcard for Sophie, his mom, and each of his friends. 

The sights of New York could never be completely exhausted, but once Jamie is ready to move on, his new friends let him use their Doorway happily. He goes through backwards and dancing, and steps through the other side to New Orleans. 

During his year spent traveling, Jamie sends his sister postcards from every place he stops long enough to breathe, and his mother from all of the ones in the states. Jack takes him to visit Ireland, a second layer of protection, and they step into fairy circles together. In Japan he eats street food and nervously visits shrines after hours of research, still unsure about his etiquette but doing his best. He attends a tea service, and the others are impressed by his impeccable manners, despite his extremely broken Japanese. Jamie hikes up to Machu Picchu and down to the Colorado River, collecting peoples’ and spirits’ stories along the way. 

At each place he stays, he remembers to leave out gifts for the spirits. His sketchbooks and journals fill up fast, and he sends them home whenever he manages to get his hands on a new one. Jack’s knives stay on him every day, and while he never needs to use them on a spirit, their presence stops a mugger in their tracks more than once. Though he travels, Jamie still finds time to practice his aim. The money-plant thrives and grows and blooms, and sometimes when he leaves, smaller money-plants are left behind in tiny pots, as gifts and thanks. 

Christmas is spent at the North Pole with North himself, and Jamie jumps at the chance to finally see the workshop in person. This year, he is gifted an empty leather-bound grimoire, with his name etched into the front in silver lettering. Magic protects him when he goes outside into the Arctic’s never-ending night, and he manages to surprise Jack by forming a snowball directly in his hand. When Jack lets him pick up his shepherd’s crook later on, pale blue frost spreads across its surface where he touches it. After four years, Jamie stops dyeing his hair, and it grows in with brown and white streaks. 

Finally, after years and years, Jack tells Jamie the story of how he died, how he saved his sister. Jamie is almost half a head taller that Jack, and he’s suddenly struck by just how young his friend was when he died. They stay up long into the night as Jack reminisces about his old life, his old family, and Jamie wakes up on the couch the next morning with a blanket draped over him and Jack gone. 

  
  


Once Jamie returns to Burgess, he drops by Inkblot Coffee near the high school, just to say hello. The shadow spirits recognize him and twine around his wrists and ankles, and when he approaches the counter, the pink-haired barista’s eyes widen, and they turn around before Jamie can order. The tea he receives is a mixture of his own creation, which he had shared with his old friend and manager at the Spice and Tea exchange, made exactly the way he likes it — with oat milk, and a spoonful of brown sugar. He tries to hand over money, but the barista refuses payment. 

“It’s on the house,” they tell him. “We’re all big fans of you here — folks all over talk about you, you know. And you visited my cousin’s Door, in New York, and she hasn’t stopped sending me your art, even though it’s been a year.” 

He rubs the back of his neck, awkward. “It’s not much, I just travel a lot. One person’s belief isn’t a lot, really, but thank you.”

“No, really,” they insist. “It  _ is _ a lot. Or at least, it means a lot to them, and you spread it around. That’s more than most people bother with.” 

  
  


Jamie goes to college in Philadelphia, still enamored with the big city, but wanting to stay near home. He is lucky enough for his connections to grant him a roommate who won’t mind his eccentricities. Plants begin to invade his living space once again, and one whole layer on Jamie’s bookshelf fills with sketchbooks. He takes classes in creative writing and art and folklore, and slowly falls in love with animation. Jack keeps him company as he draws late into the night, and Sophie cheers him on via video call when Jamie decides to change his major. 

Though he still doesn’t quite fit in, Jamie still enjoys the relative anonymity of being at a large college. He joins a club about the supernatural, but they’re more invested in ghosts than spirits, and he could tell that most don’t believe. Instead, Jamie fills his weekends by visiting an antique shop just off-campus, with a Door in one of the back rooms. The owners are a friendly older couple who recognize him, and they last two whole meetings before asking him whether or not he’s willing to sell them his tea. Jamie is, but not for their shop or for the spirits that come in through their door. 

When Jamie returns to Burgess for the winter holidays, Jack is already there. He looks years older, and their height gap nearly is nearly closed, though Jamie has perhaps half an inch on him. It’s because he partnered with the Unseelie Court, Jack tells him, and it lets him age until he wants to stop. Jack hasn’t aged for three hundred years, and Jamie wraps him into a hug. 

Without a holiday or any such thing, Jack’s Guardian work leaves him with no more to do than he would have otherwise. Jumping from city to city to spread fun isn’t work, and he’s glad to make himself useful spreading a bit of winter and mischief around as well. Jamie studied their rules and etiquette until his fingers fell off, and Jack says he doesn’t need to worry about any of that, not with him. Fae can’t lie, so Jamie takes his words at face value. 

They go to Inkblot and Jack orders a coffee for the first time, getting an iced mocha at Jamie’s recommendation. The barista’s hair is neon green this time, and when they hand Jamie his tea he considers dyeing his own hair again, maybe purple this time. When he comes home again over the summer, Pippa dyes it for him in the bathroom. 

When Jamie returns to school, he picks an apartment off campus and fills it with plants. Jack gifts him a long, long string of crystal ice beads, cold to the touch but never melting, that reflect the light every which way for Jamie’s birthday. He hangs them all over the living room, and golden light dances across the space. Once everything is unpacked, he makes the apartment’s first mug of tea, and leans out the open window into the open air, hands on the windowsill. The wood under his fingers seems to buzz, until Jamie has to yank them away from the new Door he just created. He makes sure his stash of tea is locked away in cabinets, behind clean lines of salt and bright red string. 

  
  


His new apartment is carefully welcoming, and belief is steeped like tea leaves in every corner. Strings of paper cranes and silver bells he bought at the local craft store almost a decade ago are finally brought out of storage. Trinkets that Jamie found during his gap year line the shelves and counters, and they never get dusty. Swaths of his bookshelves are filled with sketchbooks, though he does most of his art digitally now, and more space is taken up by bursting-to-full notebooks. He buys yet more bookshelves, and doesn’t even fill them with books — instead, they hold his mug collections, and art supplies, and even more trinkets. A huge pinecone he picked up in California. A handful of beautiful multicolored sea glass from a beach in England, where a glass factory once stood. An elaborate cylinder-shaped metal bell from China that jingled musically in even the slightest breeze. 

Beneath every window is a short bench absolutely covered in plants, with little stones and crystals scattered between flowerpots. Jamie removes the screens from his windows, and bowls and tins once again line his windowsills. Only the window frame of his Door remains empty, and the plants only pile more abundantly in its place. 

Where there’s space between bookshelves, Jamie hangs things on his walls. Not art, anymore, but glass cases filled with wax leaves. A silver Mardi Gras mask. Vintage black and white photographs of forests and storefronts and women in white fur coats. 

And of course, in the places of honor on his nightstand, Jamie has his money-plant, which is thankfully still alive. His first wooden throwing-knife box sits empty in the bottom drawer, the knives themselves still in use. Jars of rainwater to water his plants with sit next to it. In the top drawer sits Jamie’s leather-bound grimoire with his name etched into the cover with silver lettering, half full perhaps, but charmed to never run out of paper. Not until he is truly finished with it anyhow, and that won’t be some time still. 

He takes a course on botany for a semester, and his plants thrive. He takes a course on creative writing for another, and one of his shorter stories is published to the university’s literary magazine. Jamie orders a dozen copies and sends them all over the world — to his friends, to his family, to a barista that’s staying with their cousin in New York City, to a man that used to be the manager of the Spice and Tea Exchange in Burgess. 

His regular visitors return, sometimes through the window from outside, and sometimes through from somewhere else entirely. They tell him stories of their exploits, and sometimes his own if he asks for rumors. Sometimes his visitors let him draw them for reference, and Jamie starts designing characters for his thesis project. 

Jack visits on Sunday nights once Jamie’s finished all his classwork for movie nights, under the guise of research. They rewatch Spirited Away for the fifth time, and point out inaccuracies — there aren’t many. Jamie begs the universe to be able to meet Miyazaki some day. He would bet physical money that the man lives near a Door. 

  
  


The Burgess Seven, along with Sophie and Jack congregate back in their hometown to celebrate the New Year together. Jamie plays a shared Spotify playlist on shuffle over a Bluetooth speaker, and Pippa jokingly quizzes Sophie on the local spirits. She knows every single one. Halfway through her sophomore year of high school, Sophie’s over halfway to running a waystation of her own, Door or not. A bottle of champagne is passed around and poured into mugs and bowls and mason jars in the absence of proper glasses. Sophie tries it, spits it out, and opts for sparking apple cider instead. 

Though the window is open for Jack’s sake, and indeed he does remain near the windowsill, the number of people in the room keeps them warm. Jamie settles in a chair nearby, a couple of blankets over his legs to combat the chill of the window, and he laughs as Claude and Caleb trade off jokes and insults with fond familiarity. 

Jamie reaches over and squeezes Jack’s knee with a smile. 

“Is this good?” He whispered. It had taken time before Jack had become accustomed to being around people who can see him, and though they were among friends, Jamie had made a habit of checking in with him. 

“Yes,” Jack answered, eyes soft but not necessarily warm as he looks around the room. “This is so good.” 

Static crackles out of the radio in the corner as it announces that they’re only a minute away from midnight, and Jamie stands up as the champagne comes back his way. 

Together, the nine of them count down along with the radio, and the room feels more full than ever, as if there were more than just them crammed into Sophie’s small bedroom. Their energy fills the room, spinning around their bodies and sparking into strings of electric excitement. When midnight came they raise their various beverage holders and clink them together with cheers of celebration, ringing in the new year. Jamie rounds the room as he taps his repurposed peanut butter jar against his friends. He kisses Cupcake and Monty and Claude — the last of whom seems drunker than is reasonable — and drops a peck to the top of Sophie’s head. Jamie kisses Jack, who grips onto the front of the sweater and laughs into his mouth. 

As it approaches 1:00AM, Pippa raises her elephant mug over her head, sloshes a bit of champagne onto the floor, and grins. “To old friends!” She chirps, and there’s a chorus of agreement. 

“And friends to be made,” Monty adds. “In the year to come. That’s the point of New Years celebrations, is it not?” 

“To having a good time,” Jamie says, with a grin directed at Jack. 

“And a long one,” Sophie tells him, downing the rest of her soda and looking drunk on comradery with people older than her (you know how teenagers are), if not alcohol. 

In almost every folklore, Jamie had found mentions of soulmates, and though he had tried, he had never known any to be true. In this moment though, he could have sworn he saw identical tongues of flame in each of their chests, red strings connecting their pinkies together, their souls all fitting together like puzzle pieces. After all, why ever would he only have one soulmate? Perhaps its the alcohol, but the more Jamie thinks about it, the more nonsensical it seems. Is it not enough that they are all here, loving each other in this golden moment? 

  
  


Work on his thesis film continues, between classes and late into the night. When Jamie’s legs hurt from sitting down too long he gets up and carefully cleans each of his hundreds of trinkets individually. His tablet finally breaks, the screen shattering into uncountable pieces on his living room floor — an excuse for an upgrade Jamie empties his bank account for. He and his old roommate go out on the weekend for drinks and to catch up with one another. 

When people pass through his Door, Jamie can tell. It’s a sense in the back of his mind that he can’t shake, and he doesn’t think he ever wants to. His film is just over six minutes long, and features a boy made of winter, a door between worlds, and creatures that can’t be seen unless they’re believed in. Jamie keeps on drawing. 

His mom brings Sophie up for his graduation, letting her miss the last few days of school. The two spend the night in a hotel, and that night, Jamie quietly closes his Door. 

“I’m sorry, but I’m leaving,” he tells the apartment. Jamie doesn’t sense anyone else around, but it feels necessary for some reason. “I’ll open a new door when I settle, but I don’t know when that will be. For now, I’m going back to Burgess.” 

Nobody answers. 

  
  


Jamie returns to Burgess. He gets a part-time job at Inkblot Coffee, and they pay him extra for his tea mixtures. Not having to draw day and night was refreshing for a while, and then it got boring. He starts a webcomic, revolving around the world and story of his thesis film, and Jack drops by with stories for him to incorporate into it. 

During the winter, he goes out to Jack’s lake to draw, hardly bundled up but never cold. When a scene isn’t working out for him, he forms spikes of ice in his hands and throws them at trees until he has an idea. Eventually the spikes stop shattering, and pierce into the trunks of trees when Jamie manages to throw them just right. 

Sophie comes out to skate on the lake while Jamie draws and watches. The ice cracks underneath her, and Jamie is there in moments. 

For a moment, the ice re-freezes under his feet, strengthening, and Sophie makes it to shore. 

Then, the ice cracks, and Jamie falls. There is a special kind of loveliness in dying this way. 

  
  


Jack arrives and pulls Jamie out of the lake. His hair is dark blue and lavender purple and bleached white at the tips. His eyes are stormy silver-gray. The lake’s winter has burned into his skin, his eyes, his hair, his center. Jamie freezes the hole in the ice behind him and holds Sophie’s hand when she arrives. 

He picks up his drawing tablet and goes north with Jack, towards the courts of the Good Folk in Europe. They visit faerie circles, and fortresses, and freestanding arches, and a small empty cabin on the edges of a tiny town. Jamie updates his webcomic and calls his friends. Jamie grows flowers in front of his cabin, tulips and forget-me-nots and purple catmint, and hangs a long string of crystal ice beads from his rafters. Golden light streams through the window, and in the summer when Jack returns from Burgess, here is where he stays. 

In their backyard, Jamie builds a stone arch. He leans against the stone and it freezes over, and it buzzes under his shoulder blades as his Door opens again. 

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed, please leave a comment! My tumblr is Jackson-Overland-Frost — come and chat!


End file.
